Once Upon A Hallow's Eve
by HarryEstel
Summary: Takes place during the Chamber of Secrets after the Halloween feast and Nick's deathday party. Harry has some trouble sleeping and begins to think about what is truly means to have and be part of a family.


Disclaimer: Nope, sorry, but I still don't own Harry Potter or any of the other characters in the Harry Pottter world. If I did, everyone would already have a copy of The HalfBlood Prince. So nope, not me. I don't own, so please don't sue as I haven't any money. No profit is being made off of this story and is purely for my own and my readers entertainment.

A/N: Hey there everyone! This was just a little ficlet that popped into my head one day during class that I just had to write. It takes place during the Chamber of Secrets and it's the night of Halloween, after the message on the wall had been found. This is a one shot and I guess you could say that it sort of sets the seeds for my other fic Ascending Darkness. A huge thank you to my beta enb2004 for betaing this, so, go read her HP fics. They are fab! Well, here it is and I hope you all enjoy it!

**Once Upon A Hallows Eve**

by:

HarryEstel

When Harry had gotten up the morning of Halloween during his second year, he had had no reason to suspect that the whole day would go to hell. Yes, he had been dreading Sir Nick's death day party, but the day had turned out to be far worse than that.

After he, Ron, and Hermione had left the dreaded death day party, they had run into Mrs. Norris who, according to Dumbledore, had been petrified. And then there was that creepy message on the wall about the Chamber of Secrets, which Filch was convinced Harry had written. All in all, it had not been a good day.

Harry had been more than relieved to crawl into bed that night. Unlike most nights however, he had a very hard time falling to sleep, which was probably due to all of the thoughts in his head that were spinning around with no end in sight.

Sighing, he quietly got out of bed and walked over to his trunk, treading carefully to make sure that he didn't wake his dorm mates.

Once he was positive that everyone was still asleep and hadn't heard his movements, he opened the trunk and pulled out the two things that brought him the most comfort. His father's invisibility cloak and the album of his parents that Hagrid had given him at the end of the previous year.

Harry smiled and walked down to the common room where he would be able to see better. Once he was by the fire, he wrapped himself in the cloak, but not so that he was invisible, and opened the album.

To his surprise though, the pictures of his mum and dad smiling and waving happily at him didn't cheer him up, but instead, made him feel more depressed then ever. At first, Harry couldn't understand the sudden sadness that threatened to overwhelm him and break the barrier that he had so carefully built.

As he flipped through the album some more though, he began to understand. Before the previous summer, he had never known what is was like to be treated like a member of the family and the feeling that it gave a person. The Dursley's had never loved, cared for, nor even treated him as a relative, let alone a loved one.

The Weasley's had though, from the very moment he had shown up on their doorstep with Ron and the twins in the early hours of the morning. The Weasley's had made him feel like he was truly a part of a family and as Harry looked at the album, he couldn't help but wonder what his true family would have been like.

Would his father have ruffled his hair like Mr. Weasley did with his sons? Would his mother have cautioned him to behave and try fruitlessly to tame his wild Potter hair like Mrs. Weasley had? Would he have had younger brothers or sisters?

There were so many things he wondered about, but mostly, what life would have been like had he not been raised with the Dursley's but with his parents instead.

Harry knew that the Dursley's didn't love him, he had known that from the very beginning. His earliest memories of the Dursley's was them scolding him when had run to his Aunt Petunia after a nightmare about a bright green light and the sound of evil laughter.

They had told him never to come to them from comfort and that little boy's didn't need comfort from bad dreams. Harry had at first thought this was normal until Dudley had had a nightmare and had screamed for his parents, who of course, had come running and stayed with him for the rest of the night. That had been Harry's first inkling that the Dursley's didn't give a damn about him.

No matter how badly they had treated Harry though, they were his relatives and deep down inside, a small part of Harry had always hoped that they did love him and that they just couldn't show it for some reason.

Now Harry knew for sure that the Dursley's didn't love him and it hurt like hell. They may have been horrible and would probably continue being horrible to him, but they were his only living relatives! Yet they still didn't love him.

Was he truly that unlovable? Harry didn't think so. He could tell just be looking at the pictures of him as a baby with his parents that they loved him and by his own experiences with the Weasley family that they loved him. No, the Dursley's didn't care one damn bit and nor did they love him.

He now knew what it was that he had been missing for all of those years he had spent with the Dursley's. He had learnt from the Weasley's that everyone deserved to be loved, even him.

They had treated him as one of their own, something he had never experienced before. Harry wished more than anything that he could have known that kind of love a lot sooner in his life.

Realizing he was crying, Harry angrily wiped away the tears that he hadn't even felt falling. This was stupid, he couldn't change the past no matter how much he wished he could. His parents were dead and had been for a long time now. Come to think of it, it was Halloween, the anniversary of his parents death.

Bitter tears welled up once more in Harry's emerald eyes. For the first time in his life, he truly realized that he was all alone, that he truly was an orphan. He had no more family and his last remaining relatives hated him with a passion. He loved the Weasley's and he knew that they loved him, but they were not his family. They didn't love him in the way they did their own children, which he understood, but it still hurt.

As one tear fell down his cheek, he closed the album and closed his eyes. "I just want to have a family that loves me and wants me, is that really all that much to ask for?" he cried out softly to the empty room.

Harry shook his head remembering Dumbledore's words from the previous year. It did not do to dwell on the past for it was in the past and could not be changed.

With one last sigh, the Boy-Who-Lived wiped away the last of his tears and walked back upstairs to the dormitory.

Little did Harry know though, the common room wasn't as empty as he had thought it to be. There, on the staircase that led to the girls dormitory, Hermione Granger had seen and heard everything.

As she watched her best friend climb back up the staircase to his dorm, she made a silent promise that she would never break.

"I will always be there Harry and I swear to you, you will have a family, I'll make sure of that. You don't realize it yet Harry, but Ron and I are already a part of your family. Now, it's only a matter of enlarging it. We will always be there for you Harry, always," she said softly to the empty room.

The very next morning, an owl was sent out to the Burrow to Mr. and Mrs. Weasley detailing the events of the previous evening. The seed of having Harry become a part of their family had been planted in their minds since the he had showed up on their doorstep with Ron and the twins.  
The letter from Hermione reaffirmed their decision to go ahead with their plan to gain custody of Harry and give him the loving family he so deserved. Molly and Arthur knew that it would be a long, hard battle, but it would be well worth the effort.

Harry Potter was truly a Weasley, he just didn't know it yet.

The End.


End file.
